


Replenished

by rexluscus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Fix-It, Gen, Headmaster!Snape, Hogwarts, Post-Deathly Hallows, Unfinished and Discontinued
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-06
Updated: 2011-07-06
Packaged: 2017-10-21 02:32:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/219925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rexluscus/pseuds/rexluscus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry is tempted to try using the Deathly Hallows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Replenished

"One more thing," said Harry, and turned back to Dumbledore's portrait. "I'll meet you guys back there," he said to Ron and Hermione, without looking at them. They slipped out.

Dumbledore smiled and waited patiently with his hands folded for Harry's question.

"Since I've known you, you've said that death wasn't a bad thing, that it was natural, good, to be embraced when the time comes, an exciting journey, all that."

Dumbledore nodded, still smiling.

"So what I want to know is: why did you want to master it?" He paused. "Was it because of Ariana?"

The smile disappeared, and Dumbledore nodded again. "I never once believed that death was an evil to be avoided," he said, "but I believed at the time that some deaths came too soon; some were pointless, violent, without value. Death itself was good; occasionally the time and the manner were not. I suppose you read in Miss Skeeter's book that I once believed wizards should rule the Muggle world?"

"That bothered me a bit," Harry admitted.

"As it should. But at the time, Muggles were destroying each other by the thousands. Millions. And for no reason beyond greed, hatred, fear. They needed to be saved from themselves, I thought. None of those deaths were justified or right. Riddle's efforts look modest next to those horrible events, but they were in the same spirit."

"So you wanted to master death in order to control it, to make it so that it only happened when it should and not...pointlessly."

"Precisely. The Muggle war taught me Muggles needed to be controlled by those who knew better; Ariana taught me that death did as well. Over the years, I relinquished both lessons. Freedom is more precious than life. And none of us can claim to know better than death. It is a futile errand—how does one decide which deaths are pointless and which are not? It is pure arrogance to make oneself the arbiter of such things."

"Yeah." Harry frowned. "I see what you mean."

Walking back to Gryffindor Tower, he thought a bit. Dumbledore was right, like he always was—who was Harry to say this person should die and that person shouldn't? And yet in some cases, it was obvious. He took a detour through the Great Hall, where the fallen were laid out—many friends, many good strangers who could have been friends. Surely no one would argue that this was right. None of these people ought to have died.

He had to at least try.

He slipped out of the castle and ran to the forest, where he Summoned the Resurrection Stone. Now that he had all three, did he have the power to bring someone back to life, or was that something even the Deathly Hallows couldn't do?

The bodies in the Great Hall were watched over by survivors. He wanted nobody to witness his attempt if it went wrong, or if it turned out to be as ill-advised as Dumbledore said it was. He needed a way to test it in private.

His eyes fell on the Whomping Willow.

Snape's body was exactly as he'd left it. Eyes like glass pebbles staring at the ceiling, hair and body and clothes glued to the floor with dried gore. It was a horrible sight. Much as he'd hated the man, possibly unjustly, his had been a particularly pointless death. Killed over a misunderstanding.

Harry took out the Elder Wand and pointed it. What…what did he say? What was the spell to bring someone back to life?

" _Enervate_ ," he said lamely.

A bolt of light shot out of the wand, far more brilliant than anything his own wand had ever done, and eveloped Snape's poor body for a short second.

Harry waited, breathing shallowly. Nothing happened.

He stayed for another ten minutes, just staring at Snape's stiff, sprawled form, willing it to move. It was so strange—he knew so much more about Snape now, and here he was back with the man himself, the real Snape whom he hated, or at least his shell, and it was hard to reconcile this one with the one he'd seen in the pensieve. Hard to believe they were the same man at all.

After a while, he gave up. He didn't know the right spell, and he wasn't going to try to find it—this had been a bad idea to begin with, as Dumbledore had said. With every passing moment, he was more and more glad it hadn't worked. It would be best just to throw the stone into the lake, return the wand to the white tomb, and carry Snape's corpse back to the castle where it could lie with the rest of the honorable fallen.

Harry looked back at Snape. He was starting to look strangely comfortable there. Peaceful, almost. Harry hated to disturb him.

He'd come back tomorrow.

* * *

Ron and Hermione stood with him as he consigned the stone to the depths of the lake and resealed Dumbledore's tomb. All three of them were quiet, as though they were burying someone—and they were, in a way. They were burying the hope of defeating death.

"One more thing," said Harry, and led them toward the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack.

Hermione was the first to climb out into the room, and Harry assumed her startled cry was one of horror at the gruesome scene. Then he climbed out himself, and saw what had really upset her. Snape's body was gone.

"Dragged off by something?" Ron suggested calmly. "Could be animals about."

"M-maybe it dematerialized somehow," Hermione said. "Maybe all the Dark magic he's done—"

"Then why is Voldemort still lying stiff as a board in the Great Hall?" asked Ron.

Harry wanted to tell them. It was on the tip of his tongue to tell them. They were his friends, they'd understand. They'd see he'd only done it out of love for those people lying in the Great Hall who'd given their lives too early, and they would know he wasn't just another Voldemort trying to outwit death. He couldn't speak. It was like his guilt was choking him, cutting off his words. Just like the bubbling blood had cut off Snape's, as he'd—

Oh, God. Harry turned away from the dark red outline on the floor that perfectly delineated the contour of Snape's shoulder and head. If he was going to throw up, he hoped they'd assume it was because of the blood and not from the horror at what he'd done.

"We should search the Shack," Hermione was saying. "If he's been dragged off somewhere, we need to find him so he can have a proper burial."

"You don't supposed somebody stole him, do you?" Ron asked with morbid relish. "Is it graverobbing if there's no grave yet?"

"Come on." Hermione set off into the corridor, with Ron trotting along behind. For a moment, Harry stayed, unable to move.

They searched the Shack from top to bottom and found nothing. They went outside and searched the grounds, and found nothing. Harry went through the motions of searching, knowing they wouldn’t find anything. Snape had probably got as far away from there as he could. Did he realize the war was over and that Voldemort was dead? He'd figure it out soon enough. And was Snape still…Snape, and not something horrible, like an Inferius? Harry couldn't bear to think about that possibility.

Even so, that meant he had to find Snape as soon as possible.

He took out the Marauders' Map. It was a longshot, but it was the only place he had to start. He didn't really expect to find anything. Which was why his glasses nearly fell off when he saw a dot in the dungeons labelled "Severus Snape."

"Guys!" he shouted to his friends, who were still poking around behind some shrubs. The living Snape might very well reveal his guilt, but he needed Ron and Hermione with him; he'd faced his death at Voldemort's hands, but somehow, he couldn't, just couldn't face a newly and possibly gruesomely resurrected Snape alone.

The three of them hurried to the dungeons. When they got close, they slowed to a creep. Sounds drifted down the corridor, distant clinking and rustling like an animal rumaging in a bin, and they could see that the door to the potions closet was slightly ajar.

Hermione was the brave one. She tiptoed up to the crack in the door and put her eye to it. After a horribly long moment, she swung the door open and said, softly, "Professor?"

Harry had to swallow against the bile in his throat. Snape knelt on the ground, stringy, bloody hair framing a chalk-white face and eyes like burn marks. He looked no less dead than before, except that he was surrounded by several empty potions bottles and was in the act of guzzling another. Brown fluid ran around his chin and down his neck, past the two open gashes that had killed him.

Hermione picked up one of the empty bottles. "Blood replenishing potion. Oh, professor!" She hurried forward. He pulled back like a cornered animal. "Professor, if you don't let me fix your neck, all your new blood will just run out again."

He didn't seem to have considered this, because he held still for the moment it took her to say the spell. Then he pushed her away and staggered to his feet. His horrid gaze swept around and homed in, as usual, on Harry.

"Potter!" His voice was choked and gravelly. "You did this to me—somehow you did, I know you did!"

Harry shrank with guilt, mute as Ron and Hermione turned to him. Then he remembered the pathetic man in the pensieve, and straightened. "No, Voldemort did that to you," he replied. "I only tried to help you."

Hermione's eyes grew wider. "Harry…?"

"It was a bad idea," Harry snapped. "Just a—passing fancy. I shouldn't have done it." He glared at Snape.

"You…you used the wand, didn't you?" Hermione's lips were trembling a little. "And the stone and the cloak…you tried to do what Dumbledore said you shouldn't."

"As usual," Snape muttered.

"I'm sorry." Harry set his face. "I didn't want to tell you because I was ashamed. I didn't think it had worked."

"Well, obviously it has," Snape sneered, "and now you're stuck with the consequences—something I dare say has never happened to you before."

"Look, do you want to go back where you came from?" Harry snapped. "Because I could make that happen."

"Are you threatening me?" Snape drew himself up.

"I'm offering it to you. As mistakes go, resurrection is pretty easy to undo."

During this time, Ron had gone very quiet. He now said to Harry, "You…you can bring people back from the dead and you brought back… _Snape?_ "

"Unasked for!" Snape shouted. "And probably for his own selfish purposes! In fact, I'll bet he did it to test his methods before attempting them on someone he actually cared about!"

In addition to being accurate, Snape's remark was a bit more confessional that he'd obviously intended, because he snapped his mouth shut and turned away. He probably hadn't meant it that way, but it still planted the odd idea that Snape might actually care whether Harry cared about him.

"Why, Harry?" Ron's face was turning red, and his eyes were getting shiny. "Why _him?_ "

"Ron…" Harry rubbed his face with the heels of his hands. This was why he hadn't wanted anybody to know. "Snape's right. I wasn't sure it was going to work, and I…didn't want to get anybody's hopes up, or if something went wrong—and afterward, I didn't think it had worked—"

"I knew it!" Snape spitting mad was ordinarily a disturbing enough sight on its own, but now with his wild, blood-caked hair and gray skin and eyes that seemed to have sunk into holes where light couldn't reach, he looked demonic. How he'd got into the castle without frightening the daylights out of somebody was beyond Harry. "And I suppose you were expecting me to be _grateful_ …"

Between the beet-red fury of Ron and the bloodless hysteria of Snape, Harry was feeling a bit trapped. "Look!" he shouted at Snape. "Do you want to be alive, or not?"

Snape opened his mouth to reply, but Ron cut him off. "Sorry, Harry, but this just tears it." Ron was shaking with anger now. "You could have used that wand on Fred…on Lupin or Tonks or…or on all of them…"

"Ron, don't you see, that's why he couldn't!" Hermione made to touch his arm but didn't at the last moment. "You can't bring all those people back to life, otherwise everybody would be begging you to do it for _their_ friends and _their_ family, and it would just go on and on. You have to have death in the world, you can't just keep bringing back anybody who's got someone who loves them…"

"So," Ron was breathing hard through his nose, "so _he_ deserves to live, but not Fred."

"It was a mistake!" Harry was starting to get mad himself. "I'd thought if it worked, I'd use it to bring back Fred and the rest. But it didn't work, and I was relieved because I realized then what a bad idea it would've been, for all the reasons Hermione said."

"You could get the stone back," Ron said. "And the wand. Fred isn't everybody, he's just one person, you could quit there—"

"Ron! Stop it!" Hermione really did grab his arm this time.

"I can't do that," Harry said. "I never should have done it in the first place. I should have got rid of the stone and the wand the first chance I had."

"Right." Ron shrugged off Hermione's arm and pushed his way out into the corridor. "I'm sure everybody will understand just as well as I do." And he took off toward the stairs.

"Ron, no!" Hermione dashed after him. "You can't tell anyone! Please!"

Harry nearly ran after them, but he turned back to Snape instead. Hermione could look after Ron; somebody had to keep an eye on Snape. He found the man staring at his own hands, which were now ever so slightly less gray than they'd been a few minutes ago. "I don't— _feel_ particularly—damaged." He was talking to himself. "Terrible, yes, but not out of the ordinary."

"What was it like for you?" Harry asked without thinking. Snape's head came up. "When you were dead?"

"None of your business," Snape spat.

"I was in King's Cross station," Harry found himself saying. "When I died."

"Were you now?" Snape was back to staring at this hands. "That's fascinating. I was in Piccadilly. You'll be interested to know that the traffic in death is just as bad as it is here. Potter, could my second attempt at life kindly be free of your inanities?"

Harry suddenly remembered the pensieve.

"You'll be wanting your memories back, probably," he said.

Snape's head whipped around, his eyes wide and mortified. "Where are they?" he snarled.

"Headmaster's Office," Harry replied. "Nobody saw them but me."

That was clearly bad enough. Snape shouldered past him and ran out.

Harry tried to catch up with him, but couldn't. Along the way to the Headmaster's Office, he met a number of people, none of whom appeared to have recently been given a fright by a ghoulish creature in blood-soaked weeds. But Snape had obviously been that way, because when Harry reached the gargoyle, it said, "I'd watch out."

Snape was still putting the memories back in his head when Harry got up to the office. Dumbledore's portrait looked troubled.

"I'm sorry," Harry blurted out to him, not even acknowledging Snape, who'd glared at him with affront at being burst in upon. "It was a terrible idea and I realized it was terrible as soon as I did it and I threw away the stone and returned the wand and it'll never happen again."

"Good or bad, it is done," said Dumbledore sadly. "Severus, how do you feel about it?"

"Very little," Snape replied sourly.

"Is there anything you left life with that…didn't return when you did?"

"Am I a monster, do you mean? No, to the best of my knowledge, I am just as I was, minus several litres of blood."

"Then I don't believe any great harm has been done. As long as this incident remains isolated, no natural balance has been upset."

"Oh thank Merlin, I'm so relieved," said Snape nastily.

"What will you do now?" Dumbledore asked Snape, folding his hands. "Riddle is gone, your task is finished, I dare say your career goals are achieved…what shall be next?"

Oddly, Snape glanced at Harry. Then to the portrait, he said, "I have absolutely no idea."

* * *

Hermione was waiting down by the gargoyle, and fell into step with Harry as the three of them headed back for the dungeons. Snape was about ten feet ahead of them, pretending they weren't there. "How's Ron?" Harry asked.

"He'll be fine. He needs some time alone, though. Maybe you'd best steer clear for a few days."

"Is he going to tell anybody? Because if this got out…I can't even imagine what a disaster it would be."

"Should've thought of that before," Snape muttered.

"Yes," Harry said pointedly, "I should have. But I didn't, and here we are. Snape, you wouldn't want the extra attention any more than I do. We'll just have to say that you weren't…entirely dead."

"They'll buy it," said Hermione. "It fits his image."

She clapped her hand over her mouth. Snape actually stopped, which made them skid to a stop as well, and turned back to glare. Then he continued walking. "Don't you have anywhere else to be, or are you going to stick to me like an irritating shadow?"

"Sorry, Professor," Hermione said meekly, and to Harry she said, "We should leave him be."

"Fine," said Harry. "But where are you going, Snape? What are you going to do?"

Snape stopped in his tracks again. "Where am I going? Somewhere you are not. What am I going to do? Something that has nothing to do with you. Now _bugger off_."

"I think it's safe," said Hermione, tugging on Harry's sleeve. "We know he's not…something unnatural."

Harry stifled a smile.

"I do not need keepers," Snape said in a low and dangerous voice. "I do not need children watching me for sinister signs. Or, worst of all, protecting their friends from me. I just wish to be left alone. _Get!_ " He waved his hands at them. " _Shoo!_ "

"Just don't tell anyone." Harry tried a menacing glare. "If you do, it'll be just as bad for you, I promise. Come on," he turned and grabbed Hermione's arm, "let's give him his precious solitude."

* * *

Snape's return didn't stay a secret for long, and soon the school was swarming with rumors. Luckily, none of them mentioned resurrection. People had spoken to him, it was said. Some of the teachers, some of the Order. But nobody seemed to have seen him.

The next time they saw Snape, the third day after he'd returned, he was back to looking like he always had: ugly and unpleasant, but human. His hair was stringy but not with blood. His pallor was no longer that of a corpse. And Harry had to hand it to Snape, no matter what else he thought about him, that he knew how to make an entrance. In the morning, the doors of the Great Hall suddenly flung open and Snape strode in like the master of the house. All conversation, all movement stopped, and all faces turned toward him. The look he gave back to them was somewhere between defiant and bored. He didn't say a word.

That was when Harry remembered something. Everybody knew about her.

Harry had revealed that Snape had been on their side all along—but he'd also revealed why. He'd told everybody who'd been there that day, and thus everybody in the Great Hall at that moment, that Snape had loved Lily Potter. Among other things, that was what was in everybody's head right now as they looked at him. Did he realize it?

Snape made his way unhurriedly down the central aisle, heels clicking on the stones. It seemed like an eternity before he finally reached where Harry was standing. His face was motionless except for a faint twitching at the corners of his mouth.

"You," he said slowly, softly, " _told_ them."

"I had no choice!" Harry tried to whisper loudly, although it was probably echoing all around the big hall anyway. "They needed to know why you'd turned or they wouldn't've believed me! It's the only reason you aren't under arrest now, you know."

If he'd been looking for a way to make Snape madder, he'd found it. The twitch around Snape's mouth turned into a tremble that began to spread. "You—" he seemed not to have enough air— " _you_ —"

More footsteps on the flagstones came up behind them, and Kingsley and Professor McGonagall appeared. Snape spun toward them, still wearing part of the snarl he'd been giving Harry. They stopped a safe distance away.

"Severus," said McGonagall, "I know it's early to ask, but it must be decided as soon as possible. If you wish to stay on as Headmaster, the position is yours, but if not, we will understand. Do you wish it?"

Snape had opened his mouth, probably to insult them, but stopped. He peered at them like he didn't recognize them, lips parted.

"Severus," McGonagall ventured, "we all understand now, it's all right, we know you were Albus's spy—"

"Yes, I'm aware that you know," Snape said quickly. He glanced around, looking lost. After a while, he turned back to them. "Fine," he said gruffly. "Yes, all right, fine."

McGonagall smiled, took his hand, and patted it. Kingsley gave him a nod. Snape continued to stare at them as though they were aliens.

When they were gone, Snape looked around the room as though he didn't know where he was. Everyone was still silent and looking at him, but he no longer seemed aware of them. Finally his eyes fixed on the corpses laid out on the tables, the wounded, the huddled families, the students. "So," he said absently, half to Harry and half not to anyone, "what needs to be done?"

* * *

Snape was efficient, and, to most people's surprise, an effective leader. Everyone was relieved that he knew how to delegate, and thus only a small handful of people had the misfortune of direct contact. But he organized their efforts with great practicality and little fuss, and within two weeks, Hogwarts was inhabitable again.

During this time, funeral season had begun, and was still going on as the students returned. Harry had only attended the ones of people he'd known, and quickly grown exhausted with grief. Fred's was the hardest. He sat there, choking on the knowledge that he'd had a chance to reverse this death, and he had spent that chance instead on a man everybody loathed, for all his secret heroism. If Harry had chosen otherwise, Fred could have been alive. He could feel Ron a few seats over, thinking the same thing. He wondered if Ron would ever forgive him.

Snape didn't attend a single funeral. In fact, once the school repairs were complete, he was hardly seen at all. On the evening the students returned, he spoke to them over the feast, telling them only that he'd done his best to protect them in the months before, and that the man they'd seen then had been a mask. He vanished halfway through the meal, and nobody saw him again for days. The rumor, which Harry believed, was that he was shut up in his office, talking to Dumbledore's portrait all day. That was what the teachers said; the students thought he simply couldn't stand the sight of them, which was also probably true.

Harry imagined him at the big desk, slumped in his chair, pouring out his frustrations and begging for guidance from the tranquil old man in the portrait. Because really, who else did Snape have to talk to? He had no friends, and more responsibility than almost anyone else in the Wizarding World. Harry wondered if he was regretting accepting McGonagall's offer so quickly. He also wondered what kind of advice Dumbledore was giving him.

A few days after the students' return, Harry received a summons to see Snape in his office, which filled him with dread and curiosity. More of the latter, since Snape had largely lost his ability to scare him. He paused outside the door at the top of the stairs to listen for a moment, and sure enough, he could hear snatches of two voices.

"...to sooner or later, Severus. "

"I...nothing of the sort... "

"...he’s outside now, you know... "

Swallowing, Harry opened the door, and Snape swivelled quickly around in his chair. "Ah. Potter," he said in a flat voice. "Sit."

It was deeply odd seeing Snape behind the Headmaster's desk. He hadn't touched a thing in the office to change it from the way it had been when it had been Dumbledore's, and amid the homey warmth and the whirling, glittering gewgaws, he looked a bit like a crow atop a gingerbread house. He seemed aware of it.

Harry sat, just as he had many times when Dumbledore had been the man on the other side of the desk.

"Well, then." Snape sounded slightly uncertain. "Ridiculous as it seems, I'm appointing you to the teaching position of Defense Against the Dark Arts. It was decided that your poor education is offset by your practical experience. The library should be able to assist you in any remedial preparation you require."

He looked away, picked up some papers and put on some reading spectacles. Harry's audience with him was apparently at an end.

"Do I…have a choice?" Harry asked.

Snape looked up. "A choice?" He shrugged. "Does anybody?"

It was annoying how difficult the man could be in so few words. "I hadn't been planning on staying at Hogwarts much longer," he said.

Snape waved his hand irritably. "Either take it or don't. It doesn't matter to me."

Behind him in the portrait, Dumbledore coughed.

"You know," said Harry, "the students are starting to wonder if you're even here anymore."

"The less the students and I see each other, the happier everyone will be," Snape said to the paper he was studying.

"They're prepared not to hate you, you know," Harry said.

"Are they." He drew his brows down. "And suppose I am not prepared to not hate them?"

Dumbledore cleared his throat noisily.

"I'll stay at Hogwarts and teach if you start acting like the Headmaster and put in an appearance from time to time," said Harry.

Snape raised his head, tossed away his paper and ripped off his spectacles. Harry thought he was going to yell. Something about how stupid Harry was, in all likelihood. Instead, Snape said, "And what, precisely, am I desired to _do_ during these appearances?"

"Um, I don't know. What did you do before?"

"I spent my time maintaining my cover or attempting to thwart the Carrows without giving myself away. Occasionally, I looked after the affairs of the school. The situation's a bit different now, in case you hadn't noticed."

Harry glanced around at the portraits, and then at Dumbledore's, which looked like it was trying hard not to smile. "I'm sure one of them could help you out. You've got loads of help if you just—"

"Potter!" Snape lept to his feet. Ah, here was the yelling. "I made you a simple offer of a teaching position, which you may either accept or not accept. I did not invite you here to criticize my job performance, or offer me advice, or pity me. If you are under the impression that your having witnessed a large portion of my life gives you any special privileges with me, then let me disabuse you of that notion immediately. Now get out of here!"

Dumbledore launched into a full-blown coughing fit.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake!" Snape rounded on him. "Find a lozenge!" He swung back toward Harry, trapped and dangerous. "I said, be gone!"

"Severus," said the portrait mildly, "you cannot continue to hide up here, you know that."

"Can't I?" Snape shouted. "Then what would _you_ bloody well recommend?"

"Go to supper. Announce Harry's appointment. We'll take it from there."

When Snape turned back to him, Harry made sure he was looking absently around the room. "Fine." Snape's teeth were clenched. "Fine! But if either of you ever offer me any unsolicited advice again, _you_ —" he pointed at Harry— "will be unemployed and _you_ —" he pointed at Dumbledore— "will be face down on the carpet. Understood?"

Harry and the portrait nodded.

* * *

The combined presences of Harry and Snape at supper produced an excited murmur. Halfway through, Snape rose and cleared his throat. Silence fell instantly; everyone was curious to know what occasioned a visit from their elusive Headmaster and the Wizarding World's greatest hero.

"You will all recognize Harry Potter, I'm sure," Snape said, his smirking voice filling the hall. "You will also find the empty block on your schedules now filled, as Mr. Potter shall be teaching you Defense Against the Dark Arts for the remainder of the year, and indeed, to the best of my knowledge, indefinitely."

There was thunderous cheering. Harry stood and bowed awkwardly. Snape was looking at him sidelong, his face sour. "And I believe," he said with a smug half-smile when the cheers had died down, "that Mr. Potter has a few words to say as well."

Harry swallowed. In all fairness, he deserved that, since he'd ousted Snape from his hiding place with some force. He stood. "Um." His mouth was dry, but he was afraid to touch his drink. "I know you think I have some special abilities that helped me fight Voldemort, but the truth is, I don't." He could practically feel Snape rolling his eyes. "Every spell I used was one I learned here. Everything I did was something any of you could do. So I hope you'll keep that in mind in class, that everything you need to know boils down to a few basic spells and knowing when to use them." He sat down, feeling utterly inept. The room burst into applause again. Harry glanced over at Snape, who was shaking his head with a look of bored nausea. The other professors were clapping and smiling.

"I must admit, I'm surprised," said Professor McGonagall later, when they were back in Gryffindor Tower. "Of all the people he could have chosen—not that you aren't an excellent choice, my dear—but everyone knows how Severus feels about you…"

"Took me by surprise, too," said Harry. "Still don't know why he did it. Maybe Dumbledore's portrait put him up to it."

McGonagall lowered her voice. "Is it true that he talks to it all day?"

"Seemed that way," Harry admitted, feeling slightly disloyal.

"I am a bit sorry for him," she said. "Not a friend in the world except for some paint on a canvas. Not that it isn't entirely of his own making, of course. And none of us are about to attempt to draw him out—we'd just as well try to cuddle a grindylow."

"I don't know," Harry said thoughtfully. "I think he might be mellowing a bit. He agreed to come to supper, didn't he?"

McGonagall didn't look convinced. "If he makes trouble for you, just come to me—I've known Severus Snape since he was eleven years old and I know every trick in his book."

"D'you remember him?" Harry asked. "When he was friends with my mother?"

"I do. Nobody knew what to make of it—a bright and charming girl like her letting that sullen, spiteful boy follow her about. Something happened when they were in their fifth year, though, and nobody ever saw them together after that."

"Yeah." Harry paused on the brink of telling her what had happened. He bit it back. "I guess it had to end sooner or later."

"She was the only person I ever saw him look happy around. His Slytherin cohorts—they just made him nastier. Around her, he was a different child." She shook her head. "It all makes a sad sort of sense. But I wonder what he'll do now? He can't hide up there forever. What on Earth do you think gets Severus Snape out of bed each morning?"

"No idea," Harry said. "I'd be curious to find out."


End file.
